SARGODHA: (Parliament Times) To provide guidance to the students about the Global Undergraduate Exchange Program (UGRAD), Career Development Cell (CDC) of Sargodha University organized a special session on Friday.
The objective of this training session was to guide and train students about the selection process of global exchange program introduced by the State Department of United States and International Research Exchange Board, under which international students are provided with an opportunity to attend any American university for a period of six months.
The session was attended by alumni of the exchange program including Abdul Rauf, Mohammad Ilyas, Nimra Nawaz, Irum and Samman Mehak who shared their experiences with aspiring students. More than 700 students attended the session and learnt how they could be selected for this program.
The session was categorised into four features including significance of Global UGRAD, process for its application, guidance on writing a statement of purpose and the UGRAD alumni panel discussion where alumni shared their experience during their stay in US for counseling students.
The alumni informed the aspirants that UGRAD is an opportunity to explore community service programs, to share your culture with the Americans and to broaden perspective in other ways. They encouraged the students to prepare themselves for foreign funded scholarships, fellowships and student exchange programs such as UGRAD.
They shared that such programs provide experience to drive academic, cross-cultural and leadership competencies and also empower students to engage constructively in the civic life of their local and global communities.
Nimraz Nawa, who recently returned from the US after completing her one semester at Wilson College of Liberal Arts, Pennsylvania with flying colors, said, “I enjoyed the enriching and intellectual academic setting of the US educational institutions which makes students analytical, creative in their perception, and writing.”
Maryam Gull, Chairperson CDC told the audiences that considering the fact that studying in the US could be extremely costly, every year the United States Educational Foundation in Pakistan (USEFP) helps hundreds of Pakistani students secure scholarships and travel to the US to further their education and career.
She informed that the Global UGRAD program is designed to award undergraduate Pakistani students enrolled in a university in Pakistan including Sargodha University. The Global UGRAD-Pakistan program offers cultural/academic exchange through a non-degree program for a semester at a university in the US, she added.
It may be added here that the Global UGRAD program has gained immense popularity among university students in short span of time when it was launched by the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs (ECA) of the United States Department of State in 2010. Since its launching in 2010, nearly 1,500 Pakistani students have participated in Global UGRAD.